| Born in Los Angeles in 1938, his family moved often due to his father's job as a lineman. An aspiring violinist, Jack played in various youth orchestras and guest spots in adult ones. He also was a tennis prodigy who did quite well in various youth tournaments. And then of course, came the surfing: with two youth championships.... not for nothing did he obtain that nickname.
As a 17 year-old, the family moves to the Pittsburgh area. No problem, he had the chance to perform the violin with the Pittsburgh Symphony and earn the first tennis scholarship ever awarded by the University of Pittsburgh. But he decided to forego that scholarship and settled into the good life at a Miami Beach hotel. He served alternately as a tennis pro, a swim instructor, playboy, acrobatic diver and then had a marriage along with two sons.
But his marriage broke up, and he settled in the Melbourne Beach area, re-married and began Murf the Surfboards - the East Coast's first such factory. Yet due in part to his drinking and playboy partying (a second marriage went by the wayside) the company went under ... and Jack Murphy returned to Miami Beach, where his life went south (in more ways than one) at age 25.
Reuniting with old friends, he falls into a gang that sets out by boat at night to rob the homes of wealthy part-time residents for their jewels. It starts off small and Murf contents himself by saying,
We take the jewels, they get the insurance money and their picture in the paper, nobody gets hurt - and then, margaritas for everyone!
Yet the ante kept getting raised, to the point that they eventually want the big time and they set out to achieve it: the J.P. Morgan Gem Collection at New York's Museum of Natural History.
He and his friends noticed that (in 1964) the museum's security was quite lax: an inoperative burglar alarm system coupled with an open window in the jewel room to assist in ventilation. They used that window to gain entrance, and make off with $400,000 worth of gems - known as the Jewel Heist of the Century - including the 563-carat Star of India sapphire. They are caught within a few days and Murphy spent two years in prison. A 1975 film called Murph the Surf was made about the heist, starring Robert Conrad and Don Stroud (as Murphy).
He returns to Miami and yet continues the life of a thief - and in one of those cases, murders a woman involved in an armed robbery he participated in. For all of these crimes, he receives two life sentences at age thirty-one in 1968 (escaping the death penalty by a narrow margin). Even when he became a born-again Christian in 1971 (for appearance sake, he said) there seemed little future for Jack Roland Murphy.
Then in 1974, a former pro football player named Bill Glass brought his prison ministry group to the prison where Jack Murphy was. It was only then that Murphy seriously began the process of rehabilitation. Over the next twelve years, he served in the prison chaplaincy program and became a mentor to other inmates. Incredibly, the man who was barely spared the death penalty (and whose original parole date was set for November 2225) so impressed prison officials that he was paroled in 1986 - albeit with 'lifetime probation'.
Upon being paroled, he dedicated himself to prison ministry and has since spoken in over 1,200 prisons around the world. He says that he hates going into prisons but that "I do it because people visited me and it meant a lot. I'm not doing anything different - it's just my turn". He has an aptly-titled memoir Jewels for the Journey and directed a 1997 TV documentary "San Quentin Homecoming Reunion". Reflecting his good works: the 'lifetime probation' requirement was lifted by the State of Florida in 2000 - only fourteen years after his parole.
 
Jack Murphy is now 73 years old, helps support his ministry in part by selling his paintings of his adopted state of Florida and - in a blast from the past - was inducted into the East Coast Surfing Hall of Fame in 1997.
Now, I don't know if his ministry extends beyond prison mentoring; no idea whether he has ventured into less savory Christian Right hectoring of non-believers territory or not. Regardless: this is one of those incredible human interest stories that I find compelling; a prime example of JFK's favorite line from Luke 12:48 - "For of those to whom much is given, much is required". And his story should be required reading for any lock-'em-up type running for office. |
